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When Sigmund Freud lost his daughter Sophie he wrote a letter to his friend and colleague Ludwig Binswanger. In it he explained to her that in a way pain was a way of continuing to cling to love and as such, it was better not to let go of it completely.

When Sigmund Freud lost his daughter Sophie he was forced to change many of his theories about grief. He was fully aware that that pain, that emptiness, would never be erased. It might weaken over time, but not be forgotten. In turn, she understood that there were no shelters where she could alleviate the suffering, because the death of a child was, in her opinion, something inconceivable.

Sophie Freud was the fifth child of Sigmund Freud and Sophie Halberstad. She was born on April 12, 1893 and almost immediately became her father’s favorite.. That girl, almost without knowing why, softened the tyrannical and patriarchal character of the father of psychoanalysis. She was beautiful, determined and always determined to follow her own will beyond what her environment determined.

At the age of 20 she married Max Halberstadt, a photographer and portraitist from Hamburg. That thirty-year-old boy was not rich, nor distinguished nor did he have much projection, which is why Sigmund Freud was aware that his daughter could have some need or other. Nevertheless, He did not object to that marriage and made his daughter promise to keep him up to date with her problems and concerns.

Young Sophie did so. No one could predict that the happiness of Freud’s favorite would not last too long, and that only six years after that marriage she would end up dying.

“I work as hard as I can, and I’m grateful for what I have. But the loss of a child seems to be a serious injury. “What is known as grief will probably last a long time.”

-Letter from Freud to Ludwig Binswanger-

When Sigmund Freud lost his daughter Sophie

One year after the marriage between Sophie and Max Halberstadt, Ernst Wolfgang was born. Sigmund Freud himself is fascinated by the little boy, and as such he does not hesitate to write about that birth to his colleague Karl Abraham:

“My grandson Ernst is a charming little companion who laughs attractively when you pay attention to him. “He is a decent and valuable creature in these times where only unleashed bestiality grows.”

Let us remember that the First World War is already sweeping through Europe. Sigmund Freud was one of the first figures to warn about that disconcerting and brutal thought that was germinating even in his native Vienna. Nevertheless, His personal and family circle would not be affected until Hitler came to power in 1933.

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Until then, Freud continued to develop his work while continuing the exchange of letters with his daughter Sophie. On December 8, 1918, his second grandson, Heinz, was born. It was then that The young woman told her father that they were going through financial problems and that the arrival of that second child was a blessing… but also a problem.

Freud never hesitated to offer him the help he needed. Likewise, as we can read in Letters to his children, also He offered his daughter advice on the contraceptive methods of the time. However, they did not seem to be effective because a year later Sophie was pregnant again.

The third unwanted pregnancy, when Sigmund Freud lost his daughter Sophie

When Sophie writes to her father fearfully announcing her third unwanted pregnancy, her father responds as follows:

If you think that the news has me very angry or dismayed, you are wrong. Accept this baby, don’t be disappointed. In a few days you will receive payment for a portion of my new editions.

Now in 1920 Europe is a victim of the Spanish flu and Sophie, very weakened by her third pregnancy, ends up being hospitalized in January of that same year.. He died a few days later due to an infection. When Sigmund Freud lost his daughter Sophie, he wrote about the impact of that experience.

He explained, for example, that he could not find transportation to be with her in her last days. The only thing he could do is go to her funeral and accept a loss for which he finds no meaning or explanation. Nevertheless, The most striking thing happens nine years after that loss.. In a letter he writes to one of his best friends and colleagues, Ludwig Binswanger, it is clear that he has not yet been able to get over that experience.

“We know that the acute pain we feel after a loss will continue its course, but it will also remain inconsolable and we will never find a replacement. No matter what happens, no matter what we do, the pain is always there. And that’s how it should be. It is the only way to perpetuate a love that we do not want to abandon.”

-Letter from Sigmund Freud to Ludwig Binswanger-

Sigmund Freud and mourning

In Letters to your children We can even read the letters that Freud and Dr. Arthur Lippmann of the Hamburg hospital sent to each other after Sophie’s death. at 26 years old. In it, the father of psychoanalysis regretted that medicine could not yet provide effective contraceptive methods. Furthermore, in those letters he even lamented what he called “a foolish and inhumane law that forced women to continue with unwanted pregnancies.”

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When Sigmund Freud lost his daughter Sophie, he tried to grieve in his own way and prolonged it for more than 10 years.to the point of having to reformulate that concept in their theories.

Finally he had to accept that when facing losses one could experience both sadness and melancholy, and that both states were acceptable. Even the pain itself was a challenge compatible with survival.. It was (and is) that stubborn bond that one refuses to abandon because it stands as a way to continue clinging to the love of a loved one.